


God, I've Never Felt Young

by amabotegreywaren (IWillNotBeSilenced)



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Angsty Ronan, Gansey just wants to save everyone, Lynch angst, The Dream Thieves - Freeform, and probably kiss them too, angsty Declan, elaboration, lynch brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-05-26
Packaged: 2020-03-19 20:00:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18977371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IWillNotBeSilenced/pseuds/amabotegreywaren
Summary: ‘Declan? Declan. Fuck, Gansey, fuck. Help me!’Declan calls Ronan after the Gray Man's visit. Ronan actually picks up the phone. Secrets are revealed and emotions are not held in check.





	God, I've Never Felt Young

**Author's Note:**

> This is a very dark, complicated piece that I really wrote myself in circles trying to create. It's not what I set out for it to be, but I'm proud of it nonetheless. Find me on tumblr @blueronanpinkparrish or instagram @shipped.gold.standard

With every collision of the man’s fist with his jaw, Declan is thinking of Ronan. 

His brother’s name pulsates along with his throbbing cheekbone, the blood pumping from his nose, the few but expertly aimed punches he manages to get back at his attacker. Later, Declan will wonder whether he should have given half a thought to how a fast-purpling eye-socket might look at his internship and whether a sufficiently delivered handshake would distract from the finger marks around his throat. In the moment though, he is all defence, survival-mode, filled with blind panic and the need to prevent this happening to Ronan later down the line. The fear that it had already happened, was happening while a deft knee to the ribs left Declan doubled up and gasping, the room spinning. Lack of oxygen? Concussion? Unadulterated terror? It didn’t matter. /Ronan/. Ronan and Niall and their secret. That’s what mattered. That’s what Declan had to protect, would guard with his dying breath. 

When it’s over, and he is slumped against the base of his wall and hoping that his hallmates are out or preoccupied or stoned and won’t clock the man leaving with Declan’s blood on his knuckles, on his face, Declan is thinking of Ronan. 

His phone lies abandoned in the middle of the room and the floor tilts dangerously as he crawls onto all fours and drags himself across the room to reach it. His arm gives way inches from it and Declan cries out as his ruined cheek scrapes the school regulation carpet, trapping his arm with its dislocated shoulder beneath him. He reaches out with his other arm, fingers grasping desperately at the phone, spinning it out of his grasp. He swears, once. Forces himself forwards in a surge that closes his fingers around the phone. The movement makes him feel so sick that he lies there for a moment, face-down and in agony, feeling blood and saliva run from the corner of his mouth onto the carpet. Later, he will try to explain the stain to the cleaning lady, who has never quite taken Declan’s suave veneer at face value and he’ll end up slipping her a few bills for the extra work which she’ll scowl at but accept.

Finally, he picks the phone up. Dials Ronan’s number, puts it to his hear and listens to it ring and ring and ring and –

‘What.’

Declan’s heart drops and surges simultaneously. He screws his eyes shut.

‘/Ronan/.’ His voice is relief and agony and warning and he knows Ronan hears it because his voice sits up and says ‘Declan.’ And again, when Declan’s ragged breathing is the only response for a moment. ‘/Declan/.’ Harsh and insistent and afraid. 

‘Are you hurt?’

‘No, Declan, why – I’m coming.’

‘Ronan, Jesus, no. Stay where you are, I mean it.’

‘Stay down. I’m coming.’

‘Is Gansey with you? Tell him to lock the doors. Jam them. With everything.’ The blood in his mouth hisses between his teeth and he curses himself because he knows Ronan won’t have missed it.

‘Stay. Down. Understand? I’m on my way.’

The line goes dead. Declan lets the phone fall from his weak fingers and he closes his eyes.  
…

‘Declan? Declan. Fuck, Gansey, /fuck/. Help me!’

Declan tries to open his eyes but someone seems to have weighted his eyelids with lead. His tongue too. He feels a hand yanking his hair, a palm delivering a firm, swift slap to his cheek but he can’t tell it to stop. 

‘Ronan, stop! He could have a head or neck injury and you yanking him around like that - .’

There’s a scuffle, which is how Declan knows for sure that his brother has arrived. On Aglionby property. /Voluntarily/. For Declan.

The other voice is between fearful and exasperated and the replacement of Ronan’s calloused, aggressive hands with gentler, cooler hands on his forehead and shoulder where his shirt is ripped is how Declan knows Ronan has brought Gansey with him.

‘D?’ Oh, how Declan surges at that nickname. ‘Can you hear us?’

Declan groans because he isn’t capable of making any other sound but he’ll be damned if he lets either of them think that he isn’t aware of them. Excruciatingly so.

Ronan kicks the bookcase, which means he’s relieved that Declan hasn’t died during the drive over here.

‘Can you sit up, do you think?’

Declan lets Gansey take his good hand and wrap his other arm around Declan’s back to guide him into a sitting position. He shuffles into a place where he can support himself, but Gansey stays at his side, hands anxiously hovering close enough that Declan’s broken skin tingles.

‘Ronan?’ Declan croaks.

Ronan whirls on Declan, hands scrubbing at his hair. ‘What the fuck happened?’ His eyes are wild and every nerve in Declan’s body tells him to reassure his brother, calm him down, but there’s blood running into his eye and his mouth tastes of it and without Gansey next to him he’s worried that he might collapse again if he has to fight with Ronan right now. And that’s what they do, isn’t it? Fight. Always. 

‘There are people looking for you. Bad people. I won’t tell them anything but I need you to go. I need us to go. Leave Henrietta. You and me and Matthew. It’s the only way I can keep you safe.’

The hard lines of Ronan’s shoulders go very still, frozen by the ragged fear and exhaustion in Declan’s voice. ‘Tell them anything about what?’

‘Anything.’

And Ronan knows, then. Declan knows about the dreaming. The knowledge unfurls in his stomach on barbed wings. He wants to break something. He wants to scream. Wants to sink to the floor and cry until he can’t breathe. He can’t breathe.

‘Ronan.’ Gansey’s holding a hand out, placating, like he’s an animal that might snap and attack at the drop of a hat. ‘Hear him out.’

‘How long?’ Ronan’s voice is broken glass, coated in acid and betrayal.

‘Since the beginning.’

A rough cry tears itself from Ronan’s chest. Declan looks like it’s taking everything he has not to look away from his brother. Gansey wants to go to Ronan, wants to keep holding Declan. Wants to put the both of them in his car with Adam and Blue and drive and drive and drive. He wants all of them and he wants to fix all of them and he doesn’t have the first clue about where to start. That’s Gansey, of course. The centre of everyone’s universe, burning sun-bright and pulling everyone into his orbit. He keeps them spinning, these vital, complicated lives around him, but he is given only enough to allow him to keep them on their axis. Never enough to truly understand what holding them up would take from him, until it’s too late.

Declan says, ‘Come here.’

Gansey knows that he is speaking to Ronan, but he moves slightly closer to Declan, all the same.

Ronan’s voice is seething. ‘If you think –’

‘Ronan.’ Gansey’s voice is quiet, but leaves no room for argument. ‘Do as he says.’

Ronan fixes Gansey with an intensity that makes him hold his breath. But he listens. 

He covers the room in a few rigid strides and squats in front of Declan and Gansey. He rests his forearms on his spread knees, a deceptively casual stance, but he’s peering at his brother like he’s never seen him before. Something changes in his face as he looks, a perception changed, a decision reached. Declan sees it and reaches for him, his hand hovering in the air inches from Ronan’s face, a question. Ronan drops his head and exhales as Declan’s hand comes to rest on the back of his neck, heavily, letting Ronan hold the weight of him for a moment. 

They don’t speak; the Lynch brothers have never been good at talking. But after a moment, Ronan stands and leaves the room without a backward glance, leaving the door open, expecting Gansey to follow.

Gansey stands swiftly, suddenly hyperaware of his proximity to Declan. He looks down and tries to focus on his hands instead of Declan’s bloodied face.

‘Will you be okay, D?’

‘Yeah, Dick. You know me.’

Gansey does. He follows the sound of the BMW’s horn out of the dorm and into the night.


End file.
